The cover story for the March issue of Garden Center Magazine—which should be hitting mailboxes soon—is called “Balancing Interests: Garden retailers weigh the costs and benefits of fighting the big boxes and aligning with other independents” Among the people I talked with for this story was Ann Murphy, director of marketing for Oregon Association of Nurseries. She discussed the organization’s popular Le Tour des Plants event.
Le Tour des Plants, an outreach effort spearheaded by Oregon Association of Nurseries (OAN), has successfully brought together independent garden centers (and growers and customers) for going on four years. More than 25 retailers have signed on to support this self-guided tour of garden destinations in Oregon and Southwest Washington.
This year’s tour is scheduled for Sept. 12-20. During this period, consumers can visit garden centers and specialty nurseries, where they’ll get great deals on plants and the opportunity to attend seminars and demonstrations. OAN produces an e-newsletter and nursery guide to keep consumers up to date on tour events.
The tour was created for many reasons, said Ann Murphy, OAN director of marketing. But it wasn’t really born from a desire to battle big boxes, as much as to generate more interest in gardening.
“It wasn’t competition-driven,” she said. “It was trying to find an alternative to ‘Fall is for Planting’ campaigns, which, from what I heard, haven’t really resonated with the gardening community… We’re using this opportunity to educate consumers.”
Retailers reap benefits that result from this united effort. Murphy recalled a conversation she had with Lora Keddie, director of marketing for Al’s Garden Center with locations in Metro Portland and Salem, Ore.
“She said they alone can’t encourage people to garden more. They can advertise their products, but you really need an industry effort. That’s the role that OAN can play. We can go out and pool some resources to create a louder message than anyone can do on their own.”
-- Sarah
Great idea, but why the French "Le Tour de Plants?" Must be lot's of French speaking people in Oregon.
Posted by: trey | March 02, 2009 at 10:37 AM
Mostly Germans. Tour is the key word.
Posted by: Franco | March 04, 2009 at 09:00 PM
But the photo is so contrived and fake. Do we really need "actors" in the garden business? I wonder if the model holding the plant really cares about plants or whether she'll get her outfit dirty.
Greg Draiss
Garden Guru to the "new" Middle Class
(Warren Buffett and the others who lost billions last year)
Posted by: greg draiss | March 12, 2009 at 01:23 PM